Hi! I’m a current junior (Asian Indian male in the Bay Area) and I want to get to know my counselor better in order to get a good letter of rec. She’s a nice person and seems experienced.
So I just have a few questions:
- How much does the counselor rec matter in admissions?
- Do counselors ever give “bad” or at least cookie-cutter recs? Does this matter a lot?
- Are counselor recs limited to academic feedback or do they include extracurriculars?
- I have an upward trend in my grades, but I did poorly freshman year (lots of Bs.) I’ve only taken harder courses since then, and I’m currently taking 5 APs and 1 Honors. I am going to get a couple Bs this year too (AP English and APUSH… sigh), but my course load is wayy harder. Can the counselor comment on this in her letter of rec, and show my academic growth?
See “School Report” at https://membersupport.commonapp.org/membersupport/s/article/Are-paper-PDF-versions-of-the-application-and-or-recommender-forms-available for what your counselor will write if you apply to colleges using The Common Application.
Your counselor will rate your course selection (“most demanding” is the best rating), academic achievement, extracurricular accomplishments, personal qualities and character, and overall (for these four, “one of the top few I’ve encountered (top 1%)” is the best rating). The counselor will indicate how s/he will recommend you (“enthusiastically” is the best rating). Obviously, if you get lower ratings, that will reduce the quality of your application to the colleges you apply to.
Note, however, that California public universities (UCs and CSUs) do not use recommendations and recalculate your high school GPA using 10th-11th grade courses.